Trae Patton/NBCIn 2010, when she was just 10 years old, Evancho wowed the nation on "America's Got Talent." She comes to NJPAC Friday night.

Jackie Evancho looks and sounds to be an angel of a prodigy. A full Susan Boyle voice that springs out of a little-girl costume to present rich opera. She delivers the kind of performances that make people cry because they're so immediately stunning. "Dream With Me," beckons the title of her 2011 CD.

But a little girl she is, still. Back home in Richland, Pa., a suburb of Pittsburgh, Evancho, 12, tweets about gentle subjects. "Baby robins right in the tree next to our house," with a picture of the birds in their nest. She tweets another photo of herself smiling next to her little brother at his field day. She likes to jump on her trampoline and swim — "All that stuff," says Evancho. Hanging out with her friends, she says, "It's good to kind of get away from the star treatment."

All that might be especially necessary if your schedule includes performing solo at Lincoln Center, meeting the president and shooting a film with Robert Redford.

After she performs at NJPAC in Newark Friday, Evancho will head home Saturday then depart again for a "Great Performances" PBS special in Los Angeles, and soon after journey with her family to Russia for six days, to sing at the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum. There's little time left for traditional school, so she attends online, with supervision from her mother.

"I miss my friends in public school but it's kind of a part of something that you have to give up," says Evancho. "I'd rather perform than go to public school."

Following Evancho's debut on "America's Got Talent" in 2010, some considered the scope of her voice improbable, accusing the young singer of lip-synching. But the reality of Evancho's big voice has netted sold-out shows and two albums, "Dream With Me," and "Heavenly Christmas." Evancho says she's just finished work on a third disc.

"They're really pretty," she says of the songs. "They're all from movies and stuff." And which?

"I can't say, it's a surprise," she says, laser-beaming her infectious smile through the phone. Two years after her "America's Got Talent" adventure, she says the classical-crossover style of her music might not be different, but she is.

"My voice has matured a lot," says Evancho. This from a singer who had former "America's Got Talent" judge Piers Morgan asking "Are you sure you're not 30?" when she first performed on the show, then just 10 years old.

Evancho did not win the talent competition, ending the show as runner-up to Michael Grimm, but she remains indelibly etched in the memory of anyone that saw her on TV, or on YouTube, where she successfully entered to become part of the series' fifth season.

And she's headed for the big screen, too, slated to play Robert Redford's daughter in the Redford-directed thriller "The Company You Keep" alongside Shia LaBeouf and Julie Christie.

While the element of surprise in finding such a voice as Evancho's has drawn comparisons to Susan Boyle, who made tremendous waves on "Britain's Got Talent" the year before, Evancho herself has become something of an American precedent for the franchise. Just this week, contestant 19-year-old Andrew De Leon brought Evancho to mind, not for his goth makeup and light contact lenses, but because no one expected that opera-perfect voice to come out of that person.

Evancho says she still sometimes watches the show with her father. Of recent addition Howard Stern, she says, "He seems nice, I think he's a great judge." Looking back on her own journey through the competition, Evancho says she doesn't have a favorite judge, "But Sharon's really nice."

Other favorite moments since being launched into the spotlight have been performing with Sarah Brightman and Susan Boyle, and saying hello to President Barack Obama who, like Sharon Osbourne, Evancho calls "really nice," but also "Very serious about his job." She met Obama in 2010 while performing her "O Holy Night" at the National Christmas Tree Lighting in Washington, D.C.

Back in 2009, Evancho traveled to Newark for another show, "David Foster & Friends," after impressing Foster, a producer. She took the stage at the Prudential Center, just months before she blew Howie Mandel's mind and America began sharing her YouTube clips.

Now that Evancho's albums have garnered lofty chart positions and her name is headed for Hollywood, such momentum isn't lost on the singer. She says as much with a grownup statement to match the maturity in her voice: